How To Cultivate Employee Satisfaction for Optimal Business Success

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You need happy and satisfied employees to have a successful, long-lasting company. How your employees feel about work can affect how they operate, and if they aren’t satisfied or don’t have the proper tools, it can affect your customers. Ultimately, if your employees are fulfilled in their roles, your customers benefit from the productivity and higher standards your staff brings to their work. Let’s talk about how to make this happen.

Make Sure Employees Are Satisfied

You shouldn’t assume your employees are happy and satisfied with their work. You must ask them how they feel. You can get feedback from your employees anonymously through surveys. Or bring them in for one-on-one meetings. If you do, ask them how they like their job and the changes they’d like to see to be happier at work so they can pass those feelings on to the customer base.

A happy employee will be more engaged, they’ll show empathy, and they’ll want to go above and beyond to assist because they know it’s for the betterment of the company. You want employees who are happy when they show up for work each day. So ask them what you can do to get them there.

In addition to being happy, your staff also needs to be motivated. If you get the sense that they’re not there yet, then the office environment may be to blame. Are the leaders in your organization going above and beyond to show the employees that they’re appreciated, and are you providing some sort of initiative for them to give 110%? Consider providing recognition and rewards for a job well done, including physical rewards like gift cards and meaningful perks, such as the chance to move up within the company when they meet certain thresholds.

Some employees may want more challenges to help work feel less monotonous. These employees are great for your company. Give them the chance to take part in research and development (R&D), or provide them with tasks outside of their wheelhouse. Make sure these new tasks can contribute to customer satisfaction as well, such as creating a new help desk user interface. Furthermore, you could even consider funding professional development courses for employees who want to learn new skills. 

Give Your Employees The Tools They Need

The next step is to provide your staff with the proper tools to ensure customer satisfaction so you get positive reviews. In addition to giving them a good computer with a reliable connection, you also want to provide the tools to help them get through any interaction. Implement a ticket or help desk system to escalate service needs that may be new to them.

Also, provide a knowledge base of helpful information, including documents, how-tos, and other guidance they can access with a few mouse clicks. While text can be helpful, try to also mix in some videos and screenshots because they can give the employees a better picture of what they need to know. Finally, provide the staff with a way to report bugs in the system when they come across them. Often, your customers need to use these same systems, so ensuring that they work properly can keep everyone satisfied.

It’s also vital to continue to develop your employees over time because there are many perks to doing so. When they know that their hard work will pay off and that they could be promoted in the future, they’re likely to show more effort. Not only that, but they’ll likely stay at your company for longer and refer other top-notch employees who will further satisfy your customer's needs.

Just ensure you follow through on the development aspect instead of providing empty promises in the hope that you’ll see a bump in their production. Sit down with each employee, outline the steps they’ll need to take to be promoted, and provide guidance on achieving those goals. If they do the work, then follow through on your word. Your employees will appreciate that you appreciate them, and they’ll go above and beyond to meet the customer's needs.

Determine If Your Customers Are Satisfied

There are multiple stages in the customer’s journey. Most, if not all customers buy a product or service because it solves a problem they have. If your employees are doing good work because they’re happy in their roles, your product/service should work well from the get-go. This is the first stage at which customers can be satisfied.

Thereafter, customer satisfaction is directly influenced by customer service in the event that something goes wrong with your product/service. Their satisfaction may also be influenced by how your brand portrays itself online and elsewhere.

Throughout these stages of the customer’s journey, seek feedback to determine if your employee satisfaction efforts are lending themselves to business success.

You can gauge customer satisfaction in many ways, starting with capturing feedback immediately after a sales or service transaction. Once the customer has been assisted, the employee can offer them a chance to fill out a survey and answer honestly about how satisfied they are with what transpired. It’s wise to get their opinions immediately after the interaction so the details are fresh in their minds.

Examine client data and look at metrics such as satisfaction score and social sentiment analysis to determine their satisfaction level. You can also determine the satisfaction of your customers by looking at your return on investment. Are they returning to you after their first visit and spending money? If they’re not, then you may need to make some changes. 

Social media presence is also important because it’s a great tool for marketing your products and services. However, you must meet your customers where they are. Before you do a full-scale marketing push, research and survey your customers to see the platforms they frequent most so you know you'll reach them. Once you figure that out, engage with them regularly.

You can learn much about your customers and your employees based on how they act on social media. Most people will have no problem voicing their frustrations when they receive a broken product or get lousy service, and you can help them when you see their comments. You can also pay attention to how your staff acts on social media. Do they also complain about their job? Are they curt when the customers complain? If you’re seeing friction, then you have work to do. 

The point is that you can’t properly service your customers if you don’t have content employees, so you need to work on doing what’s best for both parties. Properly motivate your staff and then survey your customers to see if they’re satisfied, and continue to make tweaks until you get it just right.nsure your teams, business, and consumers genuinely thrive as the landscape continues to evolve.

About the Author: Luke Smith is a writer and researcher turned blogger. Since finishing college he is trying his hand at being a freelance writer. He enjoys writing on a variety of topics but technology and business topics are his favorite. When he isn't writing you can find him traveling, hiking, or gaming.